Welcome to this week’s edition of Submit Your Stories Sunday. Every week I bring you a unique call for submissions to help you find a home for your stories or inspire a new one. Each call will contain a speculative element and will offer payment upon acceptance. Next, I’ll recommend a story to inspire your submission and help newer writers understand how to fulfill a call’s thematic elements.

This week we’re looking at a call for Space and Time magazine and reading Aliette de Bodard’s The Dragon that Flew Out of the Sun.

Space and Time

Eligibility: Speculative, crossed genre stories up to 10k words (5-7.5K preferred) that “aren’t quite normal”

Take Note: acceptances are posted on Space and Time’s website and facebook page, suggesting they may not send out rejection/acceptance letters. Be sure to check on your submission.

Submit by: this short opening closes soon – on Saturday, October 5th, 2019 (eek!)

Payment: $0.01 per cent PLUS a complimentary e-subscription, print copy, pdf copy, and an audio clip of your work

Click here to go to original call for more details.

A Story to Ignite Your Writing Mojo

While Space and Time doesn’t offer samples of full stories, they do advise of an admiration for Aliette de Bodard’s work, so today we’re reading a crossed genre story of hers, The Dragon that Flew Out of the Sun, reprinted in Uncanny Magazine and available to read here.

The Dragon that Flew Out of the Sun is the story of intergalactic refugees who lost their home after their sun died and unleashed a dragon. It’s about old enemies and reconciliations and healing. Something the world could use more of these days.

On a Personal Note,

I’d hoped to write up a quick post about our local climate strike in Moncton, NB, Canada, but the event sapped this introvert’s energy more than expected. Instead I’ll leave you with this picture of me and my girls before the crowd got squishy.

Happy writing!

Welcome to this week’s edition of Submit Your Stories Sunday. Every week I bring you a unique call for submissions to help you find a home for your stories or inspire a new one. Each call will contain a speculative element and will offer payment upon acceptance. Next, I’ll recommend a story to inspire your submission and help newer writers understand how to fulfill a call’s thematic elements.

This week we’re looking at a call for submissions from Wizards in Space and reading Ari Koontz’ second star to the right (and straight on till morning) from their second issue.

Wizards in Space

Eligibility: speculative and literary stories up to 5k. Nonfiction, art, and poetry is also accepted, please see the original call for guidelines.

Take Note: for this opening, editors are looking for stories contrasting light and dark, winter and summer, and coming full circle from pain into joy.

Payment: $40 flat fee per story

Submit by: this opening closes October 18th, 2019.

Click here to go to the original call for details.

A story to ignite your writing mojo:

I’m going to switch gears a bit this week and suggest a work of creative non-fiction from this same magazine, second star to the right (and straight on till morning) by Ari Koontz, because it has a story’s soul, it captures the spirit of the full circle journey, and it’s written with the exquisite prose the journal seeks. You can click here to read it on the Wizards In Space website.

I’m always going to have a soft spot for space fantasy, and the fear and wonder in this piece takes my breath away. I don’t feel the claustrophobia Koontz feels when she looks at the Perseids, I don’t feel afraid of the vastness of our universe, but I, too, am “made of stories and science.” This is the story of finding one’s true name on the other side of all this fear, and coming around to joy after pain. This is the emotion we need to capture for this call, that moment in time, as only we can tell it.

Think about it, find your story, write it down, send it in. It’s just that easy, and that easy. Good luck writers, and happy writing.

Welcome to this week’s edition of Submit Your Stories Sunday. Every week I bring you a unique call for submissions to help you find a home for your stories or inspire a new one. Each call will contain a speculative element and will offer payment upon acceptance. Next, I’ll recommend a story to inspire your submission and help newer writers understand how to fulfill a call’s thematic elements.

This week we’re looking Inklings Press’ call for pirate stories and reading Candy Comfort by Eleanor R. Wood and published on Daily Science Fiction.

Inklings Press Pirate Anthology

Eligibility: speculative stories on theme of pirates in or around 5k words. Ghost and space pirates accepted.

Take Note: stories should aim for a PG-13 level audience

Submit by: October 18th, 2019

Payment Offered: $50 (currency unclear)

Click here to go to the original call for more details.

A Story to Ignite Your Writing Mojo

This week we’re reading a pirate flash fiction from Daily Science Fiction, Candy Comfort by Eleanor R. Wood. Click here to go read that now. I like this story because Wood chose to tell the story of a pirate family from the perspective of a little girl who is left behind while the males go raiding, a pack of sweets to comfort her. This perspective is what offers this story it’s freshness in an admittedly tired genre. Finding that unique way to tell your own story is the best way to stand out in your submission for this anthology.

What pirate story hasn’t already been told? I know, this one’s tricky. Give it some thought, brainstorm some possibilities, and get writing.

Welcome to this week’s edition of Submit Your Stories Sunday (on Wednesday, thanks to Hurricane Dorian knocking out my electricity for a few days). Every week I bring you a unique call for submissions to help you find a home for your stories or inspire a new one. Each call will contain a speculative element and will offer payment upon acceptance. Next, I’ll recommend a story to inspire your submission and help newer writers understand how to fulfill a call’s thematic elements.

This week we’re looking into Translunar Traveler’s Lounge upcoming opening and reading Wings by Vanessa Fogg from the inaugural issue.

Translunar Traveler’s Lounge

Eligibility: fun speculative stories up to 5k.

Take Note: “fun” is defined by the editors as joyful and while lighthearted fiction is welcome, stories need not be exempt from a tragedy which may highlight this joy

Submit by: this opening is from September 15th to October 15th, 2019

Payment: $0.03 per word, USD, minimum $20

Click here to go to the original call for details.

A story to ignite your writing mojo:

Vanessa Fogg’s story Wings appeared in Translunar Traveler’s Lounge‘s inaugural issue and follows a story where joy is intertwined with tragedy. Click here to go read Wings now. The narrator princess has cast off her duties to love a common poet, only to find their marriage burdened by a cruel curse which turns the poet into a rotating series of wild animals where he has no memory of himself. The princess finds him again and again, but the queen who laid this curse grows impatient with her daughter’s loyalty and threatens to destroy him forever. The princess is forced to find the only way she can be with her love before the queen finds them.

This is a classic story, which harkens to my favorite movie, Ladyhawke, but Fogg finds freshness in her retelling and an ending which appeals and leaves the reader with a warm and thoughtful joy.

Now it’s up to you, writers, get those pens/keyboards ready and write yourself something fun. Good luck and happy writing!

Welcome to this week’s edition of Submit Your Stories Sunday. Every week I bring you a unique call for submissions to help you find a home for your stories or inspire a new one. Each call will contain a speculative element and will offer payment upon acceptance. Next, I’ll recommend a story to inspire your submission and help newer writers understand how to fulfill a call’s thematic elements.

This week we’re looking at Apparition Lit’s call for stories about euphoria and reading Tina Connelly’s A Sharp Breath of Birds in Uncanny Magazine.

Apparition Lit: Euphoria

Eligibility: original speculative fiction from 1-5K on theme of euphoria

Take note: this magazine has four openings per year, each with a different theme (watch their website for future themes)

Payment: $0.03 per word, minimum $30

Submit by: August 31st, 2019

Click here to go the original call for details.

A story to ignite your writing mojo

This week’s story, Tina Connelly’s A Sharp Breath of Birds, was published in Uncanny magazine. You can click here and go read that now. I must say, finding a story that captures the theme of euphoria is difficult in this timeline of doom, which is probably why Apparition Lit chose it. A Sharp Breath of Birds is not a euphoric tale, not at first. The protagonist struggles with her sense of self, her sense of belonging, her… feathers. In growing up she loses the one person who understands her, who might have feathers too. The euphoria of this story is not found until its ending, and then it is still left up to the reader to imagine.

How can you use euphoria to drive your story rather than ending it? It’s interesting to note that astronauts have been reported to experience a sense of inexplicable euphoria in outer space, how that could that be used to craft a story? Romance, always, has its own levels of euphoria. In researching this post I came across stories of drug use, self-harm, and various vices used to reach a euphoric state. I expected to find more stories of the euphoria of birth than I did and I’m excited to see what this issue of Apparition Lit offers.

Happy writing, and good luck.

Welcome to this week’s edition of Submit Your Stories Sunday. Every week I bring you a unique call for submissions to help you find a home for your stories or inspire a new one. Each call will contain a speculative element and will offer payment upon acceptance. Next, I’ll recommend a story to inspire your submission and help newer writers understand how to fulfill a call’s thematic elements.

This week we’re looking at Fireside‘s late August opening and reading Advice for Your First Time at the Faerie Market by Nibedita Sen from Fireside’s July 2019 issue.

Fireside Magazine

Eligibility: original speculative stories up to 3k words

Take Note: Fireside wants “great stories that makes us cry, laugh, or transport us to new worlds.”

Payment: $0.125 per word (twelve and half cents per word)

Submit by: opening is from August 26th to August 30th, 2019

Click here to go to the original call for submissions.

A story to ignite your writing mojo:

Advice for Your First Time at the Faerie Market by Nibedita Sen appeared in last month’s issue of Fireside Magazine. CW for abuse. Click here to go read the story now. I love this story for the fresh twist it gives on a fairy market tale and for having a rare mother as protagonist.

The mother, whose name we never learn, is first driven to the faerie market to satisfy strange pregnancy cravings. The fey have their sights upon her unborn child, and their food magic protects the fetus when the mother’s abusive spouse pitches her down the stairs. They help her get rid of said spouse, all of this for the usual price: her child. But not until baby is sixteen years old.

Rather than have the mother give into despair or hope it doesn’t happen as we’ve seen a bit too often in faerie tales, this mother gets to work using every available tool at her disposal to ensure her daughter has the skills she needs to survive in Faerie once they come for her. Cleverness ensues, and it’s a delight to read. Sen is kind and doesn’t leave the mother-or us-entirely without hope, but she doesn’t give us a happy ending either.

For a story so short, Advice for Your First Time at the Faerie Market evokes several rounds of emotion and lingers in your thoughts once it’s done. It thrives in its own descriptions and offers rich layers to a short form. This is what you want to accomplish: a story steeped in the broth of its own world that makes your readers feel everything you can imagine for them. Good luck, writers, and happy writing.

Welcome to this week’s edition of Submit Your Stories Sunday. Every week I bring you a unique call for submissions to help you find a home for your stories or inspire a new one. Each call will contain a speculative element and will offer payment upon acceptance. Next, I’ll recommend a story to inspire your submission and help newer writers understand how to fulfill a call’s thematic elements.

This week we’re looking at Speculative City‘s call for industry themed stories and reading Cat Rambo’s story Left Behind in Clarkesworld magazine.

 Speculative City: Industry

Eligibility: original stories poetry or essays on the theme of industry up to 5500 words, including urban fantasy

Take Note: the editor is specifically looking for stories of the effects of industry upon individuals and communities within the cityscape

Payment: $20-$75

Submit by: August 19th, 2019

Click here to go to the original call for details.

A story to ignite your writing mojo:

This week we’re reading Left Behind written by Cat Rambo and published in Clarkesworld magazine. You can read it online by clicking here.

This science fiction tale, set far into the future, follows a woman who prepares the elderly to move into a virtual mind world based upon their memories while their brains and bodies unconsciously pilot ships filled with dormant humans into deep space. Only the elderly, based upon a lack of neural enhancement available in their youth, are capable of piloting these ships and as such, are considered a valuable commodity. There are massive financial incentives for families to turn over their elderly.

These un-enhanced elderly are now dying out, signalling the end to our protagonist’s profession and financial doom. The worlds she builds for these future pilots are a constant reminder of luxuries she will never afford now, as well as the choices and mistakes she never had the chance to make.

A fun trick of science fiction is the ability to create an industry that doesn’t currently exist, and use it to mirror contemporary society. The disparity between the rich and the poor and the psychological effect this has on the protagonist’s sense of valueless-ness is familiar. She works in an industry that could not exist without her, yet since she is not in a supervisory position she will be the first let go when it falters, which is any minute now. She is frantic to escape, to find a better life than the one which awaits her. This is the effect of industry upon her community, glimpsed through the individual.

Although Rambo’s story is clearly set within a city, I recommend, for this call to a publisher named Speculative City, to engage this setting more in your submission.

What other industries exist that you can use to plot a story for this call? Do any industries have a good effect on their communities? What does that look like? Can you spin a story out of it? Yeah? Then get writing and good luck.

Happy writing!